Remember Me
by buttercupandwestley
Summary: Jean is knocked out by Eren during training, and he wakes up hours later in the medical building. He goes to confront Eren, but he soon finds him missing, and no one has memory of Eren ever existing. Over the next few hours, more and more people start disappearing, and Jean will have to face his deepest fear of being alone, and the possibility of losing everyone he cares about.
1. Chapter 1

[A/N, I really liked this idea, and I promise it'll get better soon. The first chapter is really just a prologue to set up the events for the rest of the story. It's going to get really angsty in the last few chapters, and also Levi's going to hit Jean with a mop like twice. So enjoy?]

"C'mon, Kirschtein. I know you can do better than that!"

The air was cool and crisp that morning. It was too early even for the birds to be awake, and the first traces of sunlight illuminated the training grounds where Jean Kirschtein was learning to fight. Jean was falling behind in hand-to-hand combat. He would never make it to the top of the class this way, and then he could never join the military police. His first choice in a personal trainer was definitely not Eren Jaeger. In fact, his first choice had been Mikasa, but she had almost immediately turned him down. Although Jean hated to admit it, Eren was good at close combat.

"You've got to stop playing the defensive, Jean!" Eren yelled. "Have some courage! Attack! Hit me!" Jean tried to move in, but Eren blocked him.

"I can't hit you if you keep moving!" He growled.

"You think a titan's going to hold still so you can kill it? You've got to attack! What are you fighting for? What if you were the only thing between a murderer and your mom? What is you had to hit me to protect her? What if you had to hit me to protect Mikasa? To protect _MARCO_?! – AGH!"

Eren hit the ground with a dull thud as Jean's punch finally landed. Breathing heavily, Jean helped his trainer to his feet. Wiping the blood off of his face with his sleeve, Eren grinned.

"Nice, man. I didn't know you had it in you. Now that we know where your priorities lie, it's your turn to be the starving orphan with the knife."

"Don't you think the name of this exercise is a little inappropriate?"

"Don't you think you ought to be stabbing me for food, you orphan?"

Jean sighed, and lunged at Eren, a bit nervous at playing the offense. He was still preoccupied with how hard he had hit Eren before. He had never punched anyone like that before, not until he was taunted with the thought of losing his mom, or Mikasa, or….Marco. Could he have shown that sudden strength to protect Marco?

Jean was so lost in his thoughts that he left his guard down, and a jaw-shattering punch from Eren had him on the ground in a second.

"Shit, man are you OK?" Eren's voice began to fade out slowly. "Jean? JEAN?!"


	2. Chapter 2

{A/N, It'll get to the JeanMarco in the next chapter, hopefully.]

_'Damn, my head… '_  
Blinking slowly, Jean sat up. He looked around, and he realized he was in the medical building.  
_'I must've been out for a while, it looks like it's almost noon.'_  
He slid off of the cot and looked around the dark surroundings.  
_'That's funny, this place is usually brimming with nurses and patients…There's no one here.'_  
Brushing it off as a weird coincidence, Jean left the building and started off for the mess hall, intending to give Eren a piece of his mind. The jerk hadn't even stayed to see if he was OK, what an ass.  
As he entered the dining hall, Jean looked around for Eren. The mess seemed pretty vacant today; The usually loud roar of the crowd barely rose above a small buzz.  
"Hey Jean, over here!" Marco was sitting with Sasha and Connie.  
"Where've you been, Jean? Shadis was pissed when you skipped out on training this morning." Connie laughed. Jean chuckled and touched the bruise on his head. He still didn't want anyone to know that he had been punched out by Jaeger.  
" I tripped and fell this morning, and spent all morning in medical." He lied. :I was out all morning. I'm surprised Shadis didn't get the memo from the nurses."  
"Nurses?" Marco raised an eyebrow quizzically.  
"Yeah, the nurses in sick bay. It's funny though, nobody was there when I woke up." Jean's friends stared at him like he had grown a third head.  
"Jean, we don't have any nurses stationed on the base. The king figured we didn't need one here because there's only 50 trainees here right now." Jean was taken aback, this had to be a mistake.  
"50? There are over 200 on the base, Commander Erwin said so in his last speech to the students." Marco laughed.  
"How hard did you hit your head, Jean? You're acting a little weird." Jean brushed his comment off, before remembering why he came to the mess in the first place.  
"Hey guys, have any of you seen Eren? I've got some… business to discuss." He didn't expect the blank stares he was receiving now.  
"Who?" Sasha asked.  
"Eren. Eren Jaeger. I'm looking for him." Jean thought Sasha had misheard, but none of his friends seemed to be able to answer the question.  
"Is he a newbie or something? I don't know who you're talking about. Sorry, Jean." Marco just smiled as Jean felt his temper seething. If they were playing some kind of joke on him, it certainly wasn't funny. Slamming his hands down on the table, he stormed off toward where Mikasa and Armin were sitting. On a normal day, Eren would be right between them, bragging about all the titans he could 'totally take with one arm'. Since he wasn't up to an argument with Mikasa, he went straight for Armin, grabbing his shirt collar and getting right in his face.  
"Where's Eren?" He growled. On the verge of tears, Armin struggled to tear Jean off of his shirt.  
"I don't know! W-who's Eren? Is this some kind of joke, because I don't think-" He stopped speaking with a yelp when Jean dropped him straight onto the floor. No sooner had he hit the floor, than Mikasa duplicated Jean's technique, and grabbed the bully by the shirt collar.  
"Don't bully Armin. He may not be as strong as you, but that doesn't mean that you get to make up people to torment him with." She whispered, and then dropped him just as he had Armin.  
"Are you guys in on it too? God damn it, it's not funny anymore. I just want to know where fucking Jaeger is!" At this point the entire dining hall was staring at him, and he left in a fit of rage. Who the hell did they think they were, playing a stupid joke on him like that? Jaeger had to be hiding under a table or something laughing his ass off. Jean looked up, and realized he had made his way back on the training grounds. The footprints from the fight this morning were still on the ground, he noticed.  
_'That's strange.' He thought. 'There's only one set of footprints. Why does it look like I was fighting alone?'_

[A/N Do you guys want me to continue this? I have a few chapters ready to upload soon, but I'm only going to do it if people are interested.]


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Jean was getting worried. It had been 2 days since Eren had disappeared, and now there were less than 100 trainees in the camp. Among the missing were Armin, Sasha, Annie, and Reiner. The strangest thing was, no one seemed to remember that these people had ever existed. Even Mikasa had no memory of Armin or Eren. Their bunks had been removed from the barracks, and they didn't appear on the duty roster.

_'Why can no one remember them? Where did they go? And why am I the only one unaffected?'_

This had gone too far to be a practical joke, and Jean was beginning to think that the entire camp was in danger. Seeking any help he could find, he decided to talk to someone that always seemed to have the right answers.

"Is Commander Erwin in?" Jean asked the man at the desk. The secretary smiled.

"I'm sorry, you must have the wrong office. This is the Survey Corps office. Commander Levi is in charge here.

"Damn it, I forgot." He muttered, and mentally added Erwin to his list of the missing. "May I see Captain Levi, then?" To be honest, he was a bit nervous talking to Levi. Rumours had already been floating around that Jean had lost his mind, and was preaching conspiracies to all who would listen. But Jean knew if he just kept trying, someone else must surely know.

"Come in!" Jean took a breath and entered the Captain's office. Levi barely acknowledged Jean's presence before returning to his paperwork. "What can I do for you, Cadet?" his dull tone suggested that Jean's presence was unwelcome.

"Comman- I mean, Captain Levi, sir, have you seen Eren Jaeger around?" Levi looked up from his desk begrudgingly, and pinned Jean with a patronizing glare.

"I'm sorry Mr. Kirschtein, I don't keep track of your little friends. Is that all?" Jean took a deep breath and started to continue, when he was interrupted by a voice from the doorway.

"Eren Jaeger, Jean?" Pivoting quickly on his heel, Jean came face to face with a rather enthusiastic Hanji Zoe.

"Y-yes, ma'am. Do you know him?" She paused, deep in thought.

"It sounds so familiar. Levi, are you sure you've never heard of him?" Levi grunted in response, and Hanji turned back to Jean with a smile. "I'll keep working on him." She said. "If he knows anything, I'll find out and report back to you, OK? Is there anything else we can do for you, Mr. Kirschtein?"

"Well, I guess not, ma'am. Thank you."

After leaving the command headquarters, Jean trudged back to the barracks. The silence that seemed to surround him was so surreal. Just two days ago, this camp had been filled with life, and there was never a moment of silence for anyone. But now, the silence was deafening. Jean didn't know what to think, or how to understand his feelings. His entire life, he had been surrounded by people, and he never had to be truly alone.

Although no one but Jean seemed to remember their missing friends, the others in the camp still felt a collective sense of loss. There were moments when Connie would tell a joke, and look a little sad that there was no one to laugh with him. Or Mikasa would be feeling cold, and wonder why she didn't have a scarf to keep her warm.

By the end of the third day, there were less than 50 people left.

[A/N: I am definitely still updating this! I just didn't want to make it a priority if people didn't like it. If you'd like to see me continue it, please let me know! Sorry to keep you waiting!]


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

With less than 50 people left on the base, Jean was feeling more alone than ever. Since most of his friends were gone, he had taken to spending the days in the lab with Hanji, and his nights confessing all of his troubles to Marco.

"So you're telling me MORE people went missing?" Hanji asked. "It's so weird that I don't even register that the changes are happening."

"No one has except me." Jean confessed. "I'm surprised _you_ even believed me. It's a really crazy story."

"No, I'm inclined to believe you. Everything seems off to me too, I just couldn't put my finger on it until you showed up. Levi thinks we've both gone nuts, but hey, you can't please everyone!" Jean chuckled in spite of everything. He admired how Hanji could keep her spirits up even though she knew what was happening. Marco was often the same way, he noticed.

"Are you two still wasting my time with all of your stupid ass conspiracy theories?" Jean was startled out of his daydream by a voice from the door.

"Come on, Levi! Humour me a little. I believe in Jean! Haven't you felt anything…odd in the past week?" Levi huffed and held up a washcloth.

"I think it's odd that this lab hasn't been cleaned in the past 6 months." He scolded, lifting up a rag that was covered in all of the dust that had accumulated on one of the lab tables.

"You're going to mess up my samples!" Hanji reacted quickly, grabbing the washcloth and eyeing him with obvious distaste.

"Whatever, shitty glasses. Live in filth, see if I care." He turned his attention to an intimidated Jean. "Aren't you supposed to be scrubbing the floor in the barracks?" Levi asked. Jean thought about it for a moment, perplexed.

"No sir, Connie Springer's name was on the duty list today. I already finished peeling the potatoes." Jean had indeed finished the potatoes. It was a lot easier without Sasha sneaking a bite every five minutes.

"Cadet, I don't buy into your crazy stories like Shitty Glasses does. There are 40 people on this base, and Connie Springer is not one of them. Now get your head out of the clouds, and get your hands on a mop." With that, Levi whacked Jean with the mop, and eventually chased him out the door.

"You didn't have to quite so rude." Hanji huffed. She grabbed her papers and left in a scientific whirlwind.

"That was close." Erwin Smith appeared in the doorway, and Levi turned to face him. "You can't let Jean and Hanji get so close to figuring us out."

"We still haven't figured out why Jean remembers." Levi answered.

"This is going to be a lot harder than we thought."

[[A/N] So a filler chapter and a plot twist! Not bad for one short chapter. All will reveal itself in the end, I promise. Let me know if you want me to continue!]


End file.
